Gerald Ford White House Altered Rockefeller Commission Report in 1975; Removed Section on CIA Assassination Plots

After the press began publishing stories focusing on CIA plots to assassinate foreign leaders, this excerpt of a note for Gerald Ford attempts to prepare the president for possible questions relating to such activities. The note recommends that the president give no information at the time by stating simply, "I am not in a position to give you any factual account," and briefly mentioning the current investigations of CIA activities by Congress and the Rockefeller Commission.

In this Memorandum, Senior Counsel to the Rockefeller Commission Ernest Gellhorn, reaches the important conclusion that "the Executive Order establishing the Commission obliges it to investigate CIA activity within the United States in support of alleged assassination attempts." The legal reasoning behind the memo is that the Commission's charter specifies, "without functional limitations, that it shall 'ascertain and evaluate any facts relating to activities conducted within the United States by the Central Intelligence Agency which give rise to questions of compliance with the provisions of 50 USC 403.'" Gellhorn goes on to stress that, "it is in fact difficult to imagine a greater threat to individual liberty or national security than arming or funding lawless elements for the purpose of killing others. The geographic location of the planned assassination seems irrelevant and does not immunize the domestic activity from scrutiny." Consequently, Gellhorn strongly recommends that the Commission investigate these activities, stressing that, "failure to do so would, I fear, not only impair the credibility of the Commission's other findings, it could also have a damaging impact on the effectiveness of the Agency. The clear lessons of recent political history must be that attempts to hide past mistakes or misdeeds, even if the only reason they are now questioned is the emergence of a new set of stricter public standards, are unlikely to succeed and can only destroy those who tread this path."

In this Memorandum, David Belin, executive director of the Rockefeller Commission, expands on the jurisdictional and legal issues raised by Gellhorn two days earlier (Document 2) in order to open a discussion with the rest of the Commission on whether to investigate CIA assassination plots. He lays out two arguments against investigating, including if the assassination plots involved only CIA personnel, and if "the ultimate goal of the activity involved a foreign operation..." The first argument is countered by raising the issue that CIA assassination plots might have involved the recruitment within the U.S. of non-CIA personnel. He dismisses the second point, given that, "The difficulty of such an argument is that it could be applied to exclude many of the other areas the Commission has already taken to investigate." A further concern is whether the Commission should only investigate the one alleged assassination plot that involved non-CIA personnel (against Fidel Castro), or two additional plots that had come to the attention of the Commission. Belin leans towards investigating all alleged attempts given that, "the public at large might not understand the Commission drawing fine lines undertaking to investigate one assassination attempt but not undertaking to investigate the remaining two attempts. Many citizens would find it hard to imagine a greater threat to the principles for which this country stands than the threat of assassination..."

This memorandum summarizes the legal and practical arguments regarding the Commission's authority and duty to investigate CIA assassination plots, and sets the preferences of the Commission's staff, which favors investigation unless the CIA "makes full disclosure on its own." Ultimately the staff recommends that with respect to organized crime, "while respectable arguments can be made either way, by far the better view is that the alleged Mafia connection is a matter which the Commission can and should investigate." However concerning assassination plots that did not involve the Mafia, the staff members were more cautious: "The arguments from a strictly legal point of view probably preponderate against investigation, but from a practical point of view may favor investigation." Expanding in favor of the practicality of investigation, staff members conclude that, "We should not limit ourselves because of what may be embarrassing ... There is a substantial public interest in having the matter disposed of as promptly as possible." Furthermore, fearing for the Commission's legitimacy if they did not investigate, they stress that "refusal to investigate will be seen by many as confirmation that the Commission does not in fact desire to conduct a thorough and independent investigation. This is particularly true if the Commission simply ignores the charges or relies on what appears to be an overly technical reading of its charter. To investigate only the Mafia-related charges, and to ignore the others, would be the worst of both worlds."

In this Memorandum, Marvin Gray, counsel to the Rockefeller Commission, takes a more cautious approach concerning the Commission's jurisdiction to investigate CIA assassination plots since, "there are no definitive legal arguments which would settle the scope of the Commission's jurisdiction." Furthermore, he reads the Commission's charter as intended to, "preclude the examination of overseas operations or objectives of the Agency, including whether they were properly approved" - an interpretation that might cover assassinations overseas. As such, he recommends modifying the Commission's charter, "to provide for assessment of overseas operations in extraordinary cases."

This letter by Philip Buchen, counsel to President Ford, authorizes the Rockefeller Commission to investigate CIA assassination plots as approved by the president. However, in an attempt to control the investigation's final product, the authorization instructs: "Once you complete your investigation in that regard, you should advise the President of the outcome, through me, and then it can be decided whether the subject should eventually be included as an integral part of the Commission's final report or whether it may call for an earlier submission to the President and possible immediate Presidential action." The approval comes after members of the Rockefeller Commission discussed the issue with Vice President Rockefeller, having argued in favor of investigation "subject to the President's concurrence." The arguments presented to the vice president were twofold. First, the goal would be to ascertain the veracity of the allegations against the CIA. Second, the Commission would try to "determine whether existing safeguards would prevent activities of that nature in the future regardless of whether they might involve domestic of foreign conspiracies."

In this brief interview excerpt, Rockefeller Commission Executive Director David Belin asks John Warner, the CIA's general counsel, if he believes "that there is any authority that the Agency has to conduct any planned assassinations in peacetime against any foreign leader?" Warner responds: "Certainly we have no specific authorization. Whether that comes within the Constitutional authority of the President, I am not clear." Warner then elaborates that the president might indeed have the authority to order the CIA to carry out an assassination under "his inherent authority as Commander-in Chief and President."

This staff report by Mason Cargill of the Rockefeller Commission provides a brief description of dozens of CIA documents potentially related to the Agency's assassination attempts. The memo and attached report also show several of the challenges that investigators faced in trying to uncover CIA operations. Cargill was given access to former CIA Director John McCone's personal files (from November 24, 1961 through December 31, 1964), as well as documents compiled by the CIA inspector general on Operations MONGOOSE and ZR/RIFLE. These documents could only be accessed at CIA headquarters and some documents had been destroyed. Cargill concludes that the files, "certainly indicate a strong desire to bring about the downfall of the Castro government, along with extreme pressure from the President and Attorney General to find a way to do so. However, nothing in these files indicates any plans to assassinate Castro."

In this document the CIA prepares a brief description of Project ZR/RIFLE - relating to CIA plots against Castro - in response to David Belin's request for a compendium description. The summary claims the Agency could find only four files related to ZR/RIFLE. The summary itself is quite vague, merely explaining that ZR/RIFLE was an "executive action capability" dealing with the activities of a CIA asset in Europe "responsible for spotting and assessing individuals whom the Agency could use." The document acknowledges that "There are a few references in the files that might be construed as a connection with this activity, but they are so cryptic that, without additional information it would be difficult to tie them together." This document shows the difficulty of uncovering such operations-even within the CIA-as it concludes that "It appears that the Chief, [blank] decided to conceal the 'executive action capability' under the ZR/RIFLE cryptonym when he was assigned responsibility for developing this activity. Further, the virtual absence of any written material on this subject suggests that activities dealing with the 'executive action capability' were not intended to be committed to writing."

A Rockefeller Commission staff analyst describes the degree of access he obtained to various CIA records, making clear that while some materials became available other records had been destroyed or apparently did not exist.

This document by Peter Clapper, director of public affairs for the Rockefeller Commission, proposes a set of criteria for writing the report and makes a number of recommendations for CIA reforms to be included in the Commission's final report. However, Clapper has no illusions that their work is aimed at reforms. "Like it or not, we are engaged largely in a public relations job." Nonetheless, in this memo he declares "dedication to the idea that we are here to serve neither the President nor the CIA but the American people." He warns Belin that, "You may gather from the recommendations that the CIA is not high on my list of trustworthy agencies." Clapper argues in favor of making it clear "that the Agency did not in every case cooperate fully with the Commission," arguing that, "I will not be easily convinced that the week-long delay between the time when I requested to see certain Helms files and the time when I was allowed to view them was not used by the Agency to cull from those files potentially damaging material. The files which I viewed contained numerous chronological gaps which increased my suspicions. The fact that the Inspector General was assigned to leaf through the files with me and that I did not view them privately furthered the impression that I was being spoon-fed." Clapper also criticized the CIA for the many holes in its written records, recommending, "Some regulatory mechanism should be created to prohibit the destruction of written records and to require the drafting of written records on all programs requiring the expenditure of funds and on all meetings at the branch level or higher." Furthermore, he proposes a declassification process for CIA materials. Concerning covert operations, Clapper recommends that they should be transferred to another agency in order to "cleanse the Agency of one of its dirtier activities ..." Finally, he proposes an "Anti-Murder Amendment" - "that no agency of the U.S. Government will assassinate or plot to assassinate foreign leaders in time of peace ... the legislation might define peacetime as any time when there has been no declaration of war. The statute should prohibit employees and contractors of all agencies involved in gathering foreign intelligence from consideration of murder in peacetime."

Notified by the White House that the Rockefeller Commission will have to turn over materials relating to its investigation of CIA assassination plots, and feeling the pressure from such a change in protocol, Marvin Gray protests to David Belin. Gray, counsel to the Commission and lead investigator in one of its cases - the assassination of Rafael Trujillo, former President of the Dominican Republic - states that he will personally vouch for the accuracy of his report, but since no one else reviewed it staff should not be held responsible for his findings. Similarly, Gray tells Belin, "By the same token, I do not wish to appear to be responsible for any drafts you have prepared concerning the results of the investigation you undertook into other cases," referring to CIA assassination plots against Fidel Castro, which Belin investigated.

This memo from Peter Clapper, the Rockefeller Commission's director of public affairs, warns David Belin, executive director of the Commission, that if the President decides not to publish the Commission's findings on CIA Assassination plots they should be prepared to "face heavy criticism from the press and public" since it will be viewed as a "cover-up and will cast doubt on the rest of the report." Clapper goes on to explain that the arguments against publication, including suggestions that the Commission did not have enough time to finish its investigation, or that the findings are incomplete, are "weak" and "hard to justify." Clapper then speculates that if the reason for this "curious procedure" is that the president "should not be the one to admit that some previous administrations plotted assassinations, it is an argument that cannot be gracefully be made in public. Citizens would be encouraged to think there is a conspiracy among Presidents to protect their predecessors as they would have their successors protect them." Consequently, he stresses that it would be "far better to publish partial findings with the expressed hope that a subsequent investigation can be based on them than to provide such findings sub rosa to the Senate Select Committee." He closes by lamenting that "I am constantly impressed with the refusal of our leadership to try candor on the people."

In this Memo, David Belin agrees to Marvin Gray's May 28 request (Document 7) that only those investigating inquiries into CIA assassination plots should be held responsible for their respective reports. This focuses on Belin himself (on the Castro case) and Gray (Trujillo), given that the rest of the staff did not review the drafts. Furthermore, Belin stresses that both of their reports are incomplete due to time constraints and because "we were denied full access to National Security Council records including records of the 40 Committee and its predecessors." Sensing the pressures on Gray, Belin reasserts his desire that no material of substance be removed from the final report by either Gray or Hugh Morrow and that, "when in doubt the material should be kept in rather than removed ... " Belin concludes by noting the irony in the fact that the Commission's investigators have come under pressure given that, "Surely any failure on the part of any member of the staff to discover additional facts is relatively minor compared with the actual misconduct involved-particularly when that misconduct involves such activities as assassination plans."

This document shows White House Chief of Staff Richard Cheney's handwritten edits to key portions of the Rockefeller Commission report. The White House edits include inserting recommendations the Commission had not approved, eliminating ones that it had, and significantly moving around passages of the text. Among the most significant changes was one that contravened already-existing practice at the CIA, according to which agency officers had instructions to take any order they found improper directly to the director. The Commission affirmed that instruction and added the agency inspector general (IG) as a potential adjudicator. White House editors removed from the recommendation any recourse to the IG and confined the scope of the recommendation so that employees were only to report orders that came outside of established channels. The report's entire treatment of "Alleged Plans to Assassinate Certain Foreign Leaders" is removed, replaced by a brief text asserting that the commission had not had the time to cover the subject (see, by contrast, Document 13). The Cheney edit inserts more critical language in one case, concerning CIA drug experiments, describing them as "illegal." But where the original Rockefeller Commission text concluded that several other CIA activities, including domestic spying, were unlawful, the White House watered down those judgments to describe the actions as merely "improper." In the case of the government keeping files on, and creating lists of, political dissenters, where the Rockefeller Commission had flatly judged the action improper, Cheney's revisions created the impression that "many" of these records had somehow been inadvertently created by the application of certain inappropriate "standards."

This item is a draft of President Ford's opening statement for the press conference releasing the Rockefeller Commission's final report. The draft has handwritten edits from Richard Cheney's office, including edits meant to downplay the significance of the Commission's investigation on CIA assassination plots. Instead of "evidence they have concerning these allegations," the president would now say "the materials they have developed concerning these allegations." The draft goes on to explain that the assassination portion of Rockefeller's report would not be released to the public as such a disclosure would be inconsistent with the national interest. The edits also recommend that only the Senate Select Committee have access to the materials gathered by the Commission, instead of all Congressional committees investigating the intelligence community, as suggested in the original draft.

This updated draft of President Ford's opening remarks to the press concerning the release of the Rockefeller Commission Report shows that all of the suggested edits in Document 11 were accepted.

This White House briefing book, with four strategy memos attached, summarizes the Rockefeller Commission's assassination report and discusses several options for dealing with the expected fallout. Not making the assassination report public is one of the major problems anticipated. The brief asserts that the Commission's investigations on assassination plots, "add very little to the internal reviews of the same matters conducted by the CIA's Inspector General in 1967." It makes two exceptions: a brief analysis of an August 10, 1962, Special Group Augmented meeting on Operation Mongoose, and material indicating that Robert Kennedy knew of CIA-Mafia actions against Castro as early as 1961. The brief goes on to state that the Church Committee is now aware of the Special Group Augmented and Mongoose, and "will undoubtedly seek to obtain White House and other records with respect to those items."

According to the strategic analysis this creates a challenge: not providing the Church Committee with the additional documents will result in a "partial" and "misleading" history that, "create[s] the impression that the CIA was largely acting alone in these matters..." However, White House aides argued that sharing the documents "would be an unprecedented act; the minutes and other records of covert action groups have never been provided to any Congressional group under any circumstance." Further, "incalculable diplomatic ramifications" could ensue, along with "incalculable dangers to reputations of former officials." Some reputations "could be irreparably injured by unfair association with 'assassination ploys' or charges of improper connections with the CIA." The brief then outlines the advantages and disadvantages of two potential options: to provide access to all the materials to some members of Congress under strict supervision, or to respond to document requests on a case-by-case basis

The attached strategy memos discuss a speech that President Ford will give during the ceremony where he receives the final report, and how to use that platform to mitigate the focus on CIA assassination plots and to chastise the press for their focus on covert operations. For the former, one memo recommends that President Ford "reiterate his position that even contingent planning for the assassination of foreign leaders is repugnant to our system of government and state his satisfaction with the fact that this same conclusion had been reached by the Intelligence Community which had voluntarily taken some steps to correct such action." However, another memo recommends that although the president might consult with the Department of Justice and Congress as to the need for further investigations, that for the assurance of such restraints to endure, "it is unnecessary to fix blame on other Administrations for what may have happened in the past." Concerning the latter, the memo recommends that the president's "strongest comments" should be reserved for the press given their increased willingness to publish secrets. Highlighting some recent press stories could provide the basis for, "(a) strong condemnation, (b) promise of prosecution for future acts, and (c) the announced decision to seek stronger laws to protect against such stories."

This is the Rockefeller Commission's 86-page section on CIA plots to assassinate foreign leaders that was excised from the final report and not made available to the public on White House orders. With limited access to documents and heavily dependent on a dozen interviews (including Richard Bissell, McGeorge Bundy, Colonel Sheffield Edwards, Richard Helms, Gordon Gray, General Edward Lansdale, General Lyman Lemnitzer, John McCone, Robert McNamara, Walt Rostow, General Maxwell Taylor and two unnamed CIA case officers), the bulk of the report focuses on U.S. covert activities against Cuba including some assassination plots against Fidel Castro. A smaller section of the report also investigates CIA actions against the president of the Dominican Republic, Rafael Trujillo. Although the report briefly mentions plans against Congolese President Patrice Lumumba and Indonesia's President Sukarno, it concludes that, "No evidence has been found involving any other attempts to assassinate any other foreign leader which had significant overt activities within the United States. However, the reports cautions that the "nature of the activity and the degree of secrecy and compartmentation within the Agency is such that it is difficult to find any evidence of this kind unless specific facts are brought to the attention of an investigative body."

This memo to President Ford from his counsel, Philip Buchen, summarizes the Rockefeller Commission's assassination report, noting its incomplete nature given that investigators "did not have access to all of the underlying documents - including NSC and Defense records - concerning MONGOOSE." Buchen includes two attachments (not available) that discuss National Security Council and Department of Defense files concerning "the Castro matter," and "the Trujillo matter." Buchen concludes that the information in the Rockefeller Commission report and the two attachments "is about as much as we will ever know from documents readily available to us" about the Federal Government's role in plots to assassinate Castro and Trujillo. One reason is that much of the planning was probably never recorded, but "there may be many former participants in various aspects of these matters from whom information can be obtained by thorough interrogation."

In this letter, President Ford writes to the Church Committee to "urge" it not to make public its final report on CIA assassination plots. Ford warns that publication of the report will "result in grievous harm to the national interest and may endanger individuals." Focusing on the U.S. national interest, the president argues that disclosure "would likely be exploited by foreign nations and groups hostile to the United States in a manner designed to do maximum damage to the reputation and foreign policy of the United States. It would seriously impair our ability to exercise a positive leading role in world affairs." As to endangering individuals, the president writes, "that publication at this time will endanger individuals named in the report or who can be identified when foreign agents carefully study it. I am sure that none of us want such an unfortunate result." The letter closes with a final warning: "If the Select Committee elects to ignore my recommendation, it must bear responsibility for the damage which will result to the United States and harm which may result to individuals."

Senator Church replies to President Ford's October 31 letter (Document 21) and rejects the president's arguments against publication of the Select Committee's final report on U.S. assassination plots. Church explains that the final report will be made available to the public because, "In my view, the national interest is better served by letting the American people know the true and complete story. A basic tenet of our democracy is that the people must be told of the mistakes of their government so that they may have the opportunity to correct them."